Does Competition Undermine Social Support? The Case of Music Festival Vendors

• In Event: 4467 - Section on Social Psychology Refereed Roundtables (Cosponsored with Section on Sociology of Emotions)
  In Refereed Roundtable 100min: Table 2: Social Support and Injustice

Abstract

While scholars have outlined broad categories of social support and supporters, they know less about how social support operates in competitive environments. I explore this question drawing from field notes and in-depth interviews with music festival vendors, a collection of transient entrepreneurs who sell handmade, fair trade, and import goods at music festivals across the country. I find that in the music festival scene, vendors strategically and unintentionally reciprocate emotional and instrumental kinds of support, but that such support does not extend to sharing information. In this way, music festival vendors are able to simultaneously embrace and share in the benefits of a supportive vendor community while protectively keeping their personal lives and business practices at a distance.

Author

• Jaclyn Ann Tabor, Indiana University